I’ve never heard of this book, and I used to be a children’s librarian.

§ July 2nd, 2012 § Filed under dc comics § 19 Comments

So here’s a thing that popped up at the shop the other day…a 1982 children’s book called The Superkids and the Singing Dog:


The story involves a group of young friends who enjoy dressing up as their favorite all DC Comics-published superheroes — pictured here rushing into action with their “Batmobile”:


…and their chance encounter with rock star Huckleberry Jam:


…who is looking for his missing dog, Chocolate. …And the kids of course help out, canvassing the neighborhood and getting into hijinks before (SPOILER ALERT) finding the dog and reuniting him with his master.

It’s a cute book, with some nicely-expressive illustration: there’s a good bit in one of the images where, while “Batman” is working on the Batmobile and everyone else is tending to the dog, “Flash” is just running around in circles in the yard.

A quick Googling also seems to show this was the only book with these characters, at least by this author. Of course, I’m just conditioned, I suppose, into thinking everything has to be part of a series, and that there’s nothing wrong with a book like this only being a one-off. But, still, it feels like this is the sort of thing that would have lent itself to a follow-up or two. Ah, well, such are the vagaries of publishing.

Anyway, I was trying to decide what my favorite entirely-out-of-context quite from the book was, and while this one was an early contender:


…I think the winner is clear:

Also, as a reminder…in addition to all the superheroes represented in this story:


…Huck and Chocolate are also property of DC Comics, so keep your fingers crossed, and maybe they’ll get their own “New 52” book soon!

19 Responses to “I’ve never heard of this book, and I used to be a children’s librarian.”